


Five Things That Happened Afterward

by permetaform (ladywinter)



Category: Saiyuki
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-01-26
Updated: 2011-01-26
Packaged: 2017-10-15 03:10:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 764
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/156422
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ladywinter/pseuds/permetaform
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They won, of course, sorta kinda, yes really.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Five Things That Happened Afterward

**1- shot**   


> It ended, like things do. They sat in the jeep. The jeep drove away. The castle was rubble.
> 
> In the ruins, a brother lay, failed, gutted, broken in half. The stones still carry echoes of the crack. His sword still breathed nearby, with its eye looking upward in surprise, with maybe a hint of.
> 
> In a hallway she, what was left of her after the skin was blasted off after she stumbled forward blood running from everywhere, everywhere, staining what was left of the two tails of her hair red, so red, she apologized with one breath, and left him on the next.
> 
> In a chamber he stood like stone, parent pulverized around him, ribbons with letters fluttering around him like streamers, or fireworks, his mouth shut on the fire he would yell back, trapped in rock and rock and rock.
> 
> In a tube, she probably still lay contained. Possibly rotting. Ch. Easiest way to stop something is to cut the power; the bullet snapped through the glass, through the liquid, through her skull. The green squirted out of the vial that held her until the fluid fell to the level of the bullet hole, it slowly grew shadowed with red. Her eyes fell open and she uncurled a bit; she did not reach out to him, she was just dying.
> 
> He turned away. Collected the rest and they destroyed the half-alive shell of demon-king and the crunches of the armor collapsing in on itself wasn't nearly enough. Sanzo left with too many sutras on his shoulders, and none spoken because he refuses to say them for the dead.  
> 

  
**II) shelled**   


> Their jeep faced east, they knew for sure when the sun peeked awake, and they were able to see a small family (half of a family really; a mother, two children) straggling eastward too, on the road. They gave them a ride, Gojyo teased the kids and Goku didn't ask about their jewelry though he really really wanted to.
> 
> At the next town, Sanzo became stubborn, finally, and Hakkai bothered being cloyingly sweet and she, the mother, was eventually allowed to prove that she could weave.
> 
> Hakkai started cooking again, that night. Jeep approved, stopped when it next recognized a traveler, and didn't start again until Sanzo let the lanky disheveled boy catch a ride to the next town. The chatter from the back was soft, but steady.  
> 

  
**[thr'] cracks**   


> Soon the fields turned as gold as Sanzo's hair and at the next town they stopped, it begged all for extra hands ( _all_ extra hands; the land was healing). Sanzo drank tea, and watched while the rest of them clambered around in the branches of the orchard around him. Bunch of monkeys, all of them. Occasionally Goku would drop by a basket, sometimes pressing a new piece of fruit into Sanzo's hand. The last time, the peach was so ripe it split a little as he caught it and Goku darted in before he could do anything and licked the juice up from between his fingers before bounding away with a new basket. Sanzo's mouth felt too sweet, and the day was too hot.  
> 

  
**four. loaded**   


> Gojyo and Hakkai were once tapped for ox-duty in the fields, dragging the harvest rakes behind them under the hot sun and Gojyo ribbed Hakkai good-naturedly as he left him behind because _human is human, and youkai is youkai,_ and (with a glint) three bits of metal fell as the youkai more than caught up and a kappa's mouth grew dry. The wheat was tall enough, and people at the next field over just smiled when they appeared with their bushels in hand and straw bits stuck in random places. (Goku asked pesky questions the next day; and to Sanzo's consternation, Hakkai answered. Gojyo hid his face behind a beer can.)  
> 

  
**5, bullets**   


> Hakkai at one point asked Sanzo why he did not choose an automatic, knowing Sanzo's preference for efficiency. Goku replied that it was so he could concentrate on each one; he feels Sanzo's feeling, on each one, and he plucks a bit of metal almost randomly from the cliff side they walked along and they saw it for a bullet, aged.
> 
>  _This is how you know we're going home,_ Goku says cheerily.
> 
>  _Like breadcrumbs,_ Gojyo laughed. _Does that make Sanzo Greta?_
> 
> Shots ring out and both Gojyo and Goku laughs and runs, Hakkai hurrying a little to keep up, dragon wrapped around him, listening to the valley which is filled with screamed echoes and startled birds and trees getting ready for spring.


End file.
